in this issue

ISSUE 6december 2018

Royal Caribbean’s Independence of the Seas has been returned to its homeport in Southampton after a multi-million pound upgrade. Our reporter visited the revamped ship to document how the company aims to entice a new generation of cruise enthusiasts through state-of-the-art facilities.

We also review some of the world’s longest cruise journeys, where passengers can spend almost an entire year travelling between the globe’s most dazzling destinations.

Next, we profile the cruise and tourism sectors of two Caribbean nations: one the one hand, Barbados, a historically popular tourist haunt, is seeing a slouch in profits and investment, a situation which forced the country’s tourism minister to declare “a deep state of crisis”. On the other hand we have Cuba. whose cruise sector is growing, spurred on by relaxed regulations for US passengers.

Finally, we round up the best grub available on the high seas, while global ship management company V. Group offers an insight into its latest digital platform which helps managing crew members on board cruise vessels.